PRETTY TONE CAPONE – Case Dismissed (1992)

How many of y’all know what Super 8 film is? For those that don’t, it’s 8mm Film Stock. Super 8 was the home movie camera format from 1965 thru to the invention of the videotape based home systems of the late 70’s. Super 8mm generally cost around $30 for a 3minute reel (well it was when I was buying it in the 80’s/90’s), that would have to be sent to a camera distribution dealer such as Eastman Kodak for developing. Ahh, the beauty of film. I can go on about it for days, but know that digital in any capacity, will never achieve film’s raw beauty and look. Period. Expensive yes, worth it? Absolutely, viable and affordable by today’s standards? Not so much. Technology wins again. Moving on….

The point of the above blurb now leads us back to this clip. It was shot on Super 8mm film in 1992. Really, someone still using this film format in the 90’s? Pretty much unheard of. The footage is raw as fuck. Dirty grain ridden exposures and next to nothing lighting set ups, this clip reminds me of my first short films I was shooting around the age of 12. Handheld and ruff as guts.

This clip is so raw not just because of the film stock, but also because of the history and crew involved. Mobstyle were no joke! Harlem heavy hitters in the dope game & the streets who came with a vicious style plus a very public on record hatred for NWA. PT Pacino called em fakes, studio gangstas, and reportedly, PT was rumoured to be responsible for starting a riot at an NWA gig back in the day in NY.

The track is furious and the injection of vocal samples from the film “…And Justice For All” re-enacted by the actors in the clip is classic. But hands down, the street heaters pulled out in the clip are heavy as fuck. The stand-out scene has to be the Barber Shop scene where PT is getting a “T” shaved in his chest by the barber.

I think the movie Paid In Full is the only movie in existence that managed to make a movie ‘based on a true story’ and actually under exaggerate the story. I’d love to get my hands on those original cassettes from back in the day. This site is killer, thanks for letting me know about it.